That reminds me of my experience in Buenos Aires, which I wouldn't call one of the most sordid places on earth, but it definitely is a place to see a wide gap between the rich and the poor.

I had gone out to the movies at one of the malls. After the movie, I headed out past the obviously high end restaurant (the valets parking the Benzs and BMWs gave it away) and into the Buenos Aires night.

And I saw the same thing that I saw every night. 1000s of people out in the streets, opening up garbage bags and searching through them for something edible or sellable. As soon as a store put their garbage out on the street, someone would pick it up and start going through it. One very sad scene was as I was passing a McDonald's just as it was closing. The manager brought the bag out and handed it to a gaggle of 10 or so young boys. The boys tore into the bag and starting grabbing at the left over food. I saw one boy walking away from the bag very happy having half of an Egg McMuffin. It was around 11 o'clock at night, so that means that muffin had been sitting in garbage for probably 12 hours. Another depressing site was the homeless families, some with children still young enough to be breast feeding.

It was all very sad.